gloryfigures on ebay

[Master Wang]

Depending how my reviewing of my brother's assessment of the minis I bought goes, I might take the time to try starting that sticky regarding good and bad ebay sellers. That is, if I find he's wrong about thinking they are all okay, I might get grumpy enough to do something

So far I've bought 2nd edition elves from 3 different sellers, a 2nd edition deathroller from another, and orc cheerleader, goblin cheerleaders, goblins and a skaven from another, and flint churnblade from another. None of the sellers have listed the same figures which is a good sign. I'm hoping all the elves are okay as they are what I'm primarily after. The recent cheerleaders et al. are my biggest worry as they looked shiny, but the seller did send up close pics and I think it was just lighting. I'll find out in about a month when I get back to England...

[Marlow]

Until I read this thread I would never have guessed recasting was gong on! Personally I would not knowingly buy a recast, just as I would not knowingly buy a pirate DVD. However having now read this I suspect some of the figures I have maybe recasts...

I do not think it makes a difference if it is Impact or GW that is getting ripped off. Accepting one company being ripped off means you give acceptance to that person ripping other companies off. Collectors want 'stuff' because it is rare/old. If Impact stops making Deadlings does that make it right for someone else to put them back into production in a couple of years time because new players decide they must have them?

Galak said he had three types of customers, Gamers, Painters & Collectors.
When Gamers want the 2nd Ed Minis rather than the 3rd Ed Minis they are moving over into being a Collector.

[Johnny KTOU]

Does anyone know Paolo103 ?
I'm currently bidding on one of his items, but now that I saw this topic, I've got huge doubts...
He sold Zara and Ratmut for a huige price already, and now he's got one of each on ebay again... He managed to get two of the last figurine given at the Tritex bowl as well...
Maybe I'm starting some paranoia, but I've got no way to tell...

[Decker_cky]

The shiny metal is no indicator for a recast.
Some of the older figures like the 2nd edition Goblin Ooligans, Frank'n'Stein and so on were sold by Games Workshop here in Germany before they reorganized their online store.

I was able to order the old 2nd edition chaos dwarfs from GW Canada a year or two ago. They cycled the availability of those old figures around, but a surprising number would become available if you kept checking over time.

[frogbear]

When Gamers want the 2nd Ed Minis rather than the 3rd Ed Minis they are moving over into being a Collector.

Incorrect.

Maybe they just want a particular look for their team.

[Master Wang]

@ Decker_cky

How are you checking whether they having 2nd edition figures avaliable? Are you calling them or is there somewhere online you can check? It is really weird if you can occassionally buy such figures from GW but they won't sell them properly.

@ Johnny KTOU

I was bidding on one of his items, but didn't win. From the picture the quality looked good, but I guess I'll never know. If you win those items, let us know what they are like. I guess if he has those Tritext Bowl figures, the chances are someone knows him...

[Grim Reaper]

When Gamers want the 2nd Ed Minis rather than the 3rd Ed Minis they are moving over into being a Collector.

Incorrect.

Maybe they just want a particular look for their team.

i've done that. my main team is dwarf, i like some of the 3rd stuff but when i saw the 2cnd stuff, i fell in love with it. i love the detail in 2cnd stuff, i'm now only missing the 2 2cnd ed. skaven because agian, in love with the figs. my 3rd ed stuff is put up and play with my 2cnd stuff. i get alot of players that are like "where did you find those?" it tends to get people more interested in the game. i'v had 3 people jion my league because they saw my teams and started talking and they started playing.

[Decker_cky]

@ Decker_cky

How are you checking whether they having 2nd edition figures avaliable? Are you calling them or is there somewhere online you can check? It is really weird if you can occassionally buy such figures from GW but they won't sell them properly.

You can't get them anymore with the changes to their mail ordering and the removal of bitz, but when I got them, I looked up the bit codes on stuff of legends, then called and asked if they were available. It was an odd little easter egg in their system, and it had weird things like those same models not being available from the US mail order when US mail order was supplying Canadian orders, but it worked out for me.

But yea....I just found the codes and called and asked.

[boondog]

When Gamers want the 2nd Ed Minis rather than the 3rd Ed Minis they are moving over into being a Collector.

Incorrect.

Maybe they just want a particular look for their team.

Hmm. Proof positive that the "legs" mentioned by Galak are not set in stone, they are tendencies based on prevalent practices. Most "collectors" I've met are also "painters", as are many "gamers" - otherwise there wouldn't be a point to "Best Painted" competitions at tourneys, Conversely, many gamers and painters like to show off old/rare minis and tend towards "collector" behaviour. We could do worse than imagine a horizontal line, with "pure gamer" on the one end (uses unpainted minis or even plastic smurfs to represent his players) and "pure collector" on the other (never plays, never paints, buys up everything labeled Blood Bowl as soon as it hits the market. "Painters" could be represented with a vertical axis, kinda like a bell curve with a bloat on the right side, since pure gamer and pure collector don't paint, those who fall somewhere between most often do.

A question, if I may:

What is a recast?

Seems fairly obvious, right? It isn't to me. There might be guys on ebay stupid enough to advertise home-made copies of minis as such (and get banz0red for it) - they don't sell recasts, they sell "replicas".
The answer seems to be "look closely at the mini, there are many tell-tale signs". Those aren't obvious, even the most horridly produced mini might be "genuine".
Hence, the answer - as always - is: examine the context. Participate in the relevant practices. Of course, there just might be some guy really sitting on a treasure trove of old minis because his friends all stopped playing in `92 and he bought all their minis and forgot about them until he moved house.
What I'm trying to get at: imagine a really good craftsman, able to produce copies of minis that are absolutely exact copies of GW minis - well, exactly enough that no-one will ever be able to tell the difference unless he melts the mini down to examine molecular content or something like that. He puts those copies up on ebay, advertising them as genuine. I buy them, paint them up, take them to a tourney.
"Wow, look at those, where'd you get them?"
"Uh, some guy on ebay, calls himself whatshisface."
"Dude, didn't you hear? That guy's a total recaster! GW wised up and put the kibosh on him, he's in the Big House now."
"Wow, really? I never knew."
It seems to me that simply knowing that the source of the mins was a forger turns those minis into recasts even though they might be GW-produced after all. Might be the forger sold his originals, might be he wasn'T a recaster after all and wrongly accused - I'll never know. I do "know" that they are not the real thing after all, not because of what they are but because of how they are percieved.
Hence, if TBB ran a list of "Recasters on ebay" we would produce recasts, since no mini sold by any of the guys labeled "recasters" would be genuine.

[firebreather]

Just wanted to say that of late i've painted a few re-cast figures for different people, and well... it really becomes clear which ones are the recasts once you begin to paint them, the detail looses depth, and you often get much worse flash which is unlikely to be as obvious in there unpainted shiny silver state.

Personally i'd be very annoyed, if i purchased figures off someone without knowing they were recasts before i bid.

[PubBowler]

Personally i'd be very annoyed, if i purchased figures off someone without knowing they were recasts before i bid.

Regardless of whether you would buy recasts, this is an important one.
The consumer should be able to choose.

[Marlow]

Incorrect.

Maybe they just want a particular look for their team.

We disagree, by wanting a "particular look" that player is becoming a collector.

[Grim Reaper]

i disagree there. that a particular look classifies one as a collector. like i said i love the 2cnd ed. figs i have. they look great, but i also collect comics and action figs of those characters. now TO ME a collector rearly uses his collection. i get 2 of my comics, 1 to read an 1 to store. my fig are not opened they are in thier original containers, my bloodbowl 2cnd ed, dwarf and my 2cnd ed skaven teams are painted and played with, alot, i wanted them for that 'particular' look, i do collect BB stuff, but do not consider myself a 'collector'. to me a collector does not 'damage' the value of whatever it is he/she is collecting.IMO.....

[Gaixo]

I wasn't even familiar with this issue, and now suspect that several of the models I've bought over the last few months are recasts. In fact, A Chaos cheerleader just came in the mail and I'm pretty certain that it's fake (a ton of flash, exceptionally shallow detail in spots). I wish I'd known this was such a problem, but it probably would have kept me from buying any of the stuff I was after.

[GalakStarscraper]

Gaixo,

Yeah ... unfortunately it is a bit of a problem.

Its why I have notices on BBFigs.com in some places that none of the stock we sell is recast.

Galak